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iPad Virtual Keyboard censorship

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This thought has come to mind as there are many voices out there who have commented on the iPad’s ‘virtual Keyboard‘. Many have found it hard to type on and found themselves unable to touch type on it as the very nature of touch sensitivity makes it impossible make contact with the ‘keys’. In other words, you can’t type long missives, emails or any other textual input.

What if the iPad is a form of Censorship? Making it hard to comment on the internet, create content, write Twitters/email/Blogs whatever. Because the keyboard it too hard and frustrating to enter anything other than simple search phrases. A consumer ONLY device, made to fill the passive vessels that constitutes the bulk of the internet readership? Content omnivores as Pew Research calls them, an advertising and News consuming only population.

Apple knows best what you want on your iPhone.

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In another example why I’m happy with my choice of the Nokia N900 over the iPhone as Apple removes Wi-Fi finders from App Store . After all, Apple knows better than it’s customer what it should allow on IT’S product. The customer is stupid and incapable of using OUR product without proper controls.

So Apple joins Amazon in determining what the customer should be allowed to do on THEIR product.

MaePad for the N900 begs for a printer.

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I’ve been playing with the early release of MaePad and it’s quite a lot of fun. Like a sketch pad / notepad / finger paint thing. The only thing it needs is the ability to print it out in it’s full glory. And that brings back to the point about the Nokia N900, it really is a computer with a phone app installed. And while you can live without a printer for your phone, having a computer without a printer is missing something.

Apple’s iPad, misses the mark.

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Since I didn’t bother to comment on what is now a fan frenzy event and the flurry of rumors preceding it, the Apple iPad has now appeared, and I will comment, Meh! Everything that the pad does, I can do with the Nokia N900, for less money, and I can carry mine anywhere. I even have a real, though small keyboard. Mind you I like the new screen, it’s nicely sized, but I have a MacBook with a bigger better screen. Is there really a gap to fill, sure sort of, and this can fill it, maybe, but will it be the next big ‘thing’ NO!

UPDATE: The spec indicates only 720p Video playback, and that’s probably due to the performance of the Apple CPU, putting it into Intel Atom processor range as far a horsepower goes.

Social platform evolution

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In the natural world, evolution is normally a response to changes in the environment which forces adaption to the change by natural selection. If the change event is dramatic or violent life forms can become extinct before adaptive evolution can occur.

But what happens in Social Environments, Platforms, particularly virtual Social platforms. Does change and evolution happen gradually or catastrophically? And what happens to the inhabitants of that environment? Do they all migrate to the next ‘BIG THING’?

Any suggestions?

The real Question, from the big Picture.

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A fellow Blogger at A Networked World made the connection with another blogger. And Got me thinking about The Real, Next Big Question! He states;


…the talking heads all talk about this recovery, but its always a recovery “from” the crash and never, ever, about what our lives and communities and economies will look like once we have “recovered”.

What are we recovering TO?

It can’t really be the same as it was before. We have to seek new things, new jobs, and a different way of life than that which was before. That world is gone! IT will NEVER return, or better yet, SHOULD NEVER be allowed to return. It’s unsustainable and WILL collapse again (for the worst) should we ever ‘Recover’ it.

What’s needed is Vision and leadership, something sorely missing in the Irish mindset, let alone the mindless Government mindset.

Another Reason to Love Nokia and Maemo

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It’s not Google and it’s Deadly Power of Data I have always been leery of Power. I don’t buy Microsoft , and I’ve stopped playing into Apple fandom. The last computer I bought was a home-brew DIY Server built from parts I chose, powered by OpenSolaris So now it’s another validation of my still unshipped Nokia N900 and Maemo! Please let Amazon ship it soon 🙂

Nokia N900 slips shipping date.

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I looks like I’ll have to wait a bit longer for my Nokia N900, the ‘supplier’ has slipped the ship date from Oct 26th to Nov 5. I’m already anxious with anticipation, now I’ll have to take extra blood pressure pills to last out extra 10 days. The only consolation is if they manage to remove more bugs, add more software, and maybe throw in portrait mode operations 🙂

Committed to Maemo 5

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I gone and done it, I’ve committed to a pre-order for a Nokia N900 from Amazon so sometime in the next X Days I’ll be on the Maemo 5 bandwagon. After pondering Android, Vodafone 360, Palm WebOS and Maemo, I had to choose a platform based upon HOW I USE a phone rather than as a Carrier would have me use one. It’s the one phone that most mimics my current use, a Palm T/X with a tethered Nokia 6300. Since Vodafone has killed my tethering of the Nokia, I’m reduced to using the T/X WiFi only, and there is a dearth of free WiFi sites in Ireland. Given that the Blazer browser in the T/X is functionally obsolete pointed me at a ‘Full’ OS device like Maemo. And while I can, and have booted Angstrom on the Palm, it’s inability to connect WiFi and Bluethooth make that configuration interesting, but useless. Android, and particularly the Hero was especially appealing, and was my second choice. But Android appears more like a ‘Widget marketing’ platform where only the underlying core was open source. Maemo is a full fledged Linux, although not mainstream, I can hack Linux. And while the current lack of Java is curious and worrying I do know, and it has, other programming language support, even MySQL (older version).

So what is the N900, it’s a portable Linux system, with a phone app in it. more or less what I have already. I understand that! Now all I have to do is be patient until my new toy ships. Here’s hoping is ships early. 🙂

I will miss the Palm T/X, but it’s already been repurposed as a Internet radio on it’s desk stand in my office. The Nokia 6300 will also be missed, I wonder if the wife will let me keep it around as a standby?

UPDATE: More reasons for my choice Software freedom and someone else who agrees with me Maemo offers more freedom

Android (Hero) and Maemo (N900)

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The battle continues, while in London this week I got to play with several HTC Android Hero and Magic Handsets. And I have to say, the Hero really fits nice in my hand, Very pleasing phone. I did not find anyone carrying the Nokia N900 as yet so I didn’t get to see one, and hence I was disappointed in that regard. I still think that the N900 is the better choice for me, but the Hero is very tempting. Now however there is an Acer A1 Android phone soon to be released which has superior specifications to that of the Hero. And there is still the Palm Pre to try and evaluate.

I did Pat Phelan a boost and bought one of his MaxRoam SIM Cards on the plane to London. But found out that my Nokia 6300 is NOT unlocked but glued to the Vodafone network. So I had to wait until I got back to Cork to try out the SIM in my old Motorola F3. and it worked a Treat.

I tried to up grade my wife’s mobile to the Samsung Tocco Lite before we left for London, but she would have none of it until we returned, clinging on to her familiar V177 Motorola.

Virtually Yours, Not!

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In the online virtual world this kind of response is surprising,

thanks for your invite to join your network. I try and keep my Lxxxxxxx network clean so don’t tend to link to people whom I have not met or with whom I do not have an existing relationship.

I work from home, sometimes manage to get off work to make it to an Open Coffee Cork meeting, I blog, I develop websites, maintain websites, Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook, FriendsFeed etc. I almost don’t have a real world to meet people in, and in this virtual world, it’s a little bit Old Fashioned to not connect with people with which you have no facetime with. I’m not really sure if I find that refreshing, or insulting. But I’ll probably cease inviting anyone into any of my networks again.

Decisions decisions too many mobile phone choices.

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For a change, I have money to burn, some, anyway, and while I love my Nokia 6300 mobile phone, I thought I’d splash out and go for a new ‘smartphone’. But the choices are endless, I like the Nokia E71, but I know that there is an upgrade to the Nokia E72 , then there is the New Nokia N900 with the New Maemo OS, and more or less future proof. Or how about the HTC (Android) Hero. Of the three, I like the N900, but the E72 has better ergonomics, more like a phone. Which is what it’s supposed to be.

Any suggertions?

It doesn’t pay to be a cranky old Blogger.

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I posted my latest fabulous project Fleeting Thoughts and no one read it. In fact, no one clicked on it, and no one commented either. The only conclusion is that either the project is rubbish, or because I’m a cranky old Blogger, with no friends. Obviously the latter, as the idea is fantastic ( if poorly executed by me), it now comes as no surprise to me, the cranky old Blogger, that social networks don’t support the cranky behavior, of cranky old Bloggers!

You have to be ‘Social’

So, if you are doing social ‘things’ on the internet, like Twitter applications, be sociable, have lots of followers, who also have lots of followers, who like to Re-Twit!